


The Ragged Thread

by nothinbuttherain



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Pre-Relationship, Season 3, UST, patch-up fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-28
Updated: 2016-01-28
Packaged: 2018-05-16 21:36:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5841859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothinbuttherain/pseuds/nothinbuttherain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set in season 3; Marcus returns from his mission with Bellamy, Monty and Indra trying to discover what's happened to Clarke injured. Abby tends to him herself, making more of a fuss out of his wound than necessary. </p><p>Teaser: "He doesn’t speak, he just reaches out and softly strokes her cheek with his thumb, lightly brushing away a smear of blood on her skin, his or someone else’s he doesn’t know, but he feels her lean in ever so slightly to his touch, welcoming it, encouraging it, indulging in it."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Ragged Thread

The Ragged Thread

“What were you thinking?” she demands tersely, slamming the door behind them and glowering at him until he sits on the edge of the bed.

“I was thinking that-“he begins mildly but she interrupts him before he can think of something to say, 

“No. You weren’t thinking. That was the right answer there Marcus,” she growls at him flatly, her eyes flashing, daring him to challenge her. He doesn’t dare. An army of Grounders between him and a potential lead on Clarke was nothing to her fury breaking over him now.

After a moment he says quietly, “I only wanted to get an idea of the facts before I worried you,” her expression softens, almost imperceptibly but it does soften and he notices the slight change in her eyes even though her stern frown remains firmly in place and she continues to storm around the small room like a loose hurricane.

“So instead of radioing me to tell me some cover story you just decided to disappear with no word and no warning?” she shoots back at him, “Clarke did that too, Marcus and she hasn’t come back for three months.” He flinches slightly, not having considered it in that light, a rush of understanding about the depth of her agitation flooding through him, “And when you do come back,” she says, her fingers now deftly working free the guard uniform with the practiced ease of having had to deal with too many wounded soldiers trapped up inside it, “You come back in bloody tatters,” she concludes with a snarl of impatient disgust at his shoulder when, having finally managed to bare it and found it red and slick with blood.

“That’s a little harsh,” he murmurs quietly, keeping his tone as calm and even as he can in hopes of soothing her a little, “It’s only a scratch, Abby.”

“It could have been much worse than only a scratch,” she says, pouring antiseptic onto a swab of cotton with a vehemence that might have implied that it was at fault for his injury before she begins dabbing, a little too hard, at his cut to clean it.

He yelps in pain, more startled than truly hurt but she withdraws and softens at once, collapsing down onto the bed beside him, the fight and fury all seeming to go out of her in one. “I’m sorry,” she murmurs, tossing down the sodden rag and dragging her fingers through her hair, clearly at her wit’s end in a way he hadn’t recognised immediately before. He’d known that she was angry and frustrated with him, both things that he knew from experience would pass fairly quickly, but what he’s seeing now is something different, something rawer and much more vulnerable and harder to tame, distress and anxiety and something bordering closely on terror.

“It’s okay,” he says softly, reaching over and gently taking her hand in his, rubbing the tips of his fingers absently up and down over hers and trying to communicate without words that he’s alright.

Shaking her head she picks up another wad of cotton, wets it with antiseptic, and takes a fresh attempt at cleaning out his wound, a little more gently this time, her eyes deliberately lowered from his. Her breathing catches slightly as she turns away to wet her cloth again.

“Abby,” he whispers softly, tenderly catching her wrist and stopping her before she can return to cleaning his wound and steadily avoiding his gaze.

“I have to clean this, Marcus,” she tells him, her voice shaking in a way it never did when it was full of fearful anger, now it’s just full of a fear she’s desperately trying to suppress, “It could get infected, you need stitches and-“

“Abby,” he repeats again, just as quietly before, the ‘ _look at me_ ’ is unspoken but unmistakably heard by her he’s sure.

Closing her eyes tight she takes a deep breath then forces herself to meet his gaze again. With a brave stab at her previous fierce disapproval she demands, “What?”

He doesn’t speak, he just reaches out and softly strokes her cheek with his thumb, lightly brushing away a smear of blood on her skin, his or someone else’s he doesn’t know, but he feels her lean in ever so slightly to his touch, welcoming it, encouraging it, indulging in it. The concern is evident in the contact and silently communicates his desire for answers, for vulnerability, for a truth she isn’t sure she’s ready to share. But before she’s fully made up her mind on that point she’s sharing it anyway.

“After Jake died and Clarke was imprisoned on the Ark I was more alone then than I had ever been,” she feels him tense slightly and shift uncomfortably beside her but she remains still and close to him, trying to convey that she didn’t mean to upset him, she fights to keep her voice steady and stares straight ahead at a scuff on the wall opposite, unable to actually look at him however, finding it easier just to speak out loud than to direct her words specifically at anyone.

 “Now she’s gone again,” she breaths, “She’s been gone for three months and I know that she needs time, that she needs to come to terms with what she did, I know that coming back here would have hurt her, would have reminded her of what happened but...” she swallows hard, taking a deep, steadying breathe she forces herself to continue, “But it’s been three months. Three months and now she has a bounty on her head...”

She breaks off, closing her eyes, unable to stop the tremble that flutters through her. Her hands are twisting around the cotton in her hands, tearing it to shreds without really noticing what she’s doing and it takes him gently lacing their fingers together again to make her stop.

“We both know she’s handled much worse than that before,” he says quietly, giving her hand a soft squeeze.

“I know. I’m worried about her, of course I am, she’s my daughter but...I know she can take care of herself, I know she’s a survivor,” her voice breaks and she closes her eyes again.

“She gets that from you,” he tells her softly, his hand tentatively lifting from the bed and settling between her shoulder blades, rubbing gently, trying to soothe her, and succeeding somewhat as well.

The contact is intimate and there’s something instinctive in it as well, because it does calm her and she realises, for just a moment, how much she’s missed having someone to do things like this for her, simple as it is. The comfort she finds in another person’s touch was something she thought she’d long since forgotten.

She turns to look up at him for the first time since he made her stop and open up, “I’m not surviving this very well, Marcus,” she lets herself admit faintly to him, finding a strange, twisted sort of comfort in the depth of understanding in his eyes, “I only have so many pieces of myself left. Clarke’s one of them and I’ve lost her again. You’re another,” that catches his attention more sharply than anything else and he watches her with wide-eyed concern for a long moment.

“The thought of losing you too right now...It scared me,” she whispers softly, not even trying to stop her body and her voice from shaking, “More than anything else has in a long time,” she murmurs to him, refusing to break eye contact with him, demanding that he hear this, that he feel it to the same degree that she does, that he understand, “So it’s not just a scratch, Marcus, it’s not just a little wound that I can stitch up and put bandages around and everything will be okay,” she lets her fingers lightly trace the ragged line of broken skin on his shoulder as she speaks, “It’s not okay,” she tells him, her voice shattering as she adds in a strangled whisper, “I’m not okay,” she hates the way her voice breaks then and tries to control it, with little success as she chokes, “I’m not okay with losing you. Not okay with being alone again. I can’t do that, Marcus, I can’t go through, I can’t, I can’t, I-“

“Hey, hey, hey,” he murmurs softly, gently putting his arms around her and holding her to him, one hand on the back of her head, cradling it in against his chest, his fingers absently tangling through her hair, wanting nothing more than to comfort her, “I’m sorry,” he whispers quietly into the top of her head, his breath hot against her skin, “I’ll be more careful, alright? I promise.”

“You better,” she says, the stern growl in her voice ruined somewhat by the way it’s still shaking and thick with unshed tears, “Or I swear, the next time you get yourself into a situation like this I’m going to march out of camp and come and find you and drag you back here myself, am I clear?”

“Yes ma’am,” he says in such exaggerated fashion that he manages to drag a faint smile from her.

“Now,” she says in a much more business like way, hastily drying her eyes on the back of her sleeve, hoping he doesn’t notice as she clears her throat and continues, “This still needs cleaned and stitched.”

“Are you sure about that?” Marcus asks warily, eyeing the pre-threaded curved needle in the suturing kit sitting innocently on the bed beside them.

“Yes,” she says very firmly, picking it up and eyeing him threateningly so he doesn’t move, a faint edge of vindictiveness in the grim smile that tugs at her lips as she says, “Keep still.”

Grumbling incoherently he turns away and faces the wall, wincing and grimacing all the while as she begins stitching up the ragged wound in his shoulder. “Maybe this will encourage you to be more careful next time,” she admonishes sternly as he squirms in protesting discomfort once more and she has to use her other hand to keep him on the bed beside her.

“Your bedside manner leaves a lot to be desired,” he tells her in a faint stab at humour through gritted teeth as he glowers fixedly at the wall opposite her.

Smiling slightly at that she says in a quieter, gentler voice, “I’m nearly done, two more and that’ll be it,” he just gives a terse nod to show that he’s heard and understood. When she ties off the last stitch and cuts loose the spare suturing thread she watches him visibly relax, all of his muscles unclenching at once as he settles back in relief.

Peering at his shoulder she presses the area lightly and runs her fingers over the fresh stitches, testing them. Nodding in approval she tells him, “That should keep you together until you’ve healed,” he starts to shrug his arm back into his shirt but she shakes her head, “Stand up and take it off,” she instructs instead, turning her back on him and opening up a small metal tray behind her, tugging out a thick coil of bandages.

She turns back to see him raising an eyebrow at her and feels a faint pink flush creep into her cheeks in spite of herself as he says with his typical dry humour, “We have a bar now, Abby, there’s no excuse for not buying me a drink before you try and get me out of my clothes.”

Eyeing him for a moment she eventually allows her lips to tug a soft smirk across her face, her eyes dancing lightly as she says, a little more throatily than she’d intended, “Later. Shirt off now.”

He does as he’s told without question or complaint this time and she moves in closer, “Lift your arms,” she instructs, “You’ll be running around those damn woods again in no time, I’m sure,” she grumbles, “I’m not having this wound get infected, emergency amputation isn’t how I want to deal with this.”

“No,” he agrees, “I’d rather you didn’t.”

Moving in closer she unwinds her bandage and begins wrapping it around his shoulder, going slowly, checking the tightness and his range of movement as she does so knowing that a small mistake here limiting him even slightly could prove fatal in the split seconds he has to react to dangers beyond the walls. As she works she’s intimately aware, for the first time with him, of how close they are. She can feel the heat radiating from his skin and his eyes upon her as he gazes down at her.

Feeling unaccountably flustered she steps back, tugging here and there before she lets herself meet his eye again and asks, “How does that feel?”

He cautiously rolls his shoulder a few times, wincing only slightly, “It’s a little tender, but I think that has more to do with the gaping wound than your bandaging skills. Thanks.”

“I can give you something for the pain,” she says, turning away from him and opening another drawer, pulling out two small orange bottles of pills already made up.

Turning back to face him she sees him shaking his head, “It’s alright,” he says firmly, “It’s not that bad, keep them for someone else who needs them more.”

Her eyes flash dangerously at him and takes another few steps in towards him until she’s right in front of him, “It’s not that bad now because you still have adrenaline coursing through your system,” she tells him flatly, “It’s going to get bad and you need to sleep, take them,” she insists, slamming them down onto the bed behind him then holding up the second orange bottle,” And take these two,” she orders, “They’re antibiotics to prevent infection and if I find that you haven’t taken them I will tie you to this bed and force you to take them intravenously every day.”

The threat works as desired and he meekly accepts that bottle and sits it carefully with the painkillers she’d forced on him as well. Stepping in closer to him she takes his hand and gently pulls it towards her, making him extend his arm. Leaning forwards she lets her fingers trace lightly over the now faint scar, the only remnant of the self-inflicted wound that had been designed to kill him to buy peace for them all those months ago.

 Her eyes meet his briefly before she centres herself in front of him again, her eyes drifting downwards to his still bare chest, her fingers lifting, almost of their own accord, to feather over other, older injuries that have faded in to scars by now, even the newer ones he acquired when the Mountain Men seized them at camp and he had struggled to prevent them from doing so.

“They’re healing nicely,” she says, unable to drag her fingers away from his skin, though he doesn’t seem to mind the prolonged contact at all, but needing to think of something to say to explain her behaviour.

He nods, “How about you?” he asks quietly and when she glances up to find him looking down at her she raises an eyebrow in confusion, “Your legs,” he says softly and a faint shiver runs through her at the mention, at the memory.

“They’re healing, I mean, they’ve healed,” she says, her fingers lightly tracing the outline of a fresh bruise, the ghost of some impact sustained in the scuffle, “You can barely see them anymore, unless you know where to look for them,” she explains, knowing that he would know, that he would see them now as clearly as if they were still raw and bleeding.

He nods and absently brushes her hair back, his fingers brushing against her skin as he does so, both of them either unaware of the intimacy of their situation, of how close they are, of how tense the atmosphere is around them or else acutely aware but utterly unconcerned. “And you?” he asks quietly, the tips of his fingers lightly accenting his words against her skin.

“I’m healing too,” she assures him softly, “It’s just...Taking a little more time,” she says.

He nods and opens his mouth to say something else when the door opens behind them, making both of them jump and causing them to break eye contact for the first time in minutes.

“Abby, I-“ Jackson begins then stops, faltering rather comically mid-sentence as he takes in the two of them.

Marcus pulls his shirt on behind her as she turns, trying to conceal how flustered she is to address Jackson, “What is it?”

“There’s a couple here to see you about the contraceptive implant removal you discussed last week,” he tells her, fixedly not looking at Marcus behind her. 

“Yes,” Abby says, remembering all at once, “Yes, tell them I’ll be with them in a moment please, Jackson,” he nods once and withdraws, unable to stop his gaze flickering wonderingly between the two of them before he does.

“You,” she says, turning back to Marcus, picking up the pill bottles on the bed, “Take one of these with food in the morning and the same at night,” she instructs, pressing the antibiotics into his hand, “And take these whenever you need to,” she says, even more firmly, pressing the painkillers on  him as well, “That means whenever you start to feel the pain in your shoulder...And likely everywhere else if some of those bruises are anything to judge by,” she catches his arm as he makes to leave, “Promise me you will,” she says quietly, “I’ve got no shortage of them, not now we have Mount Weather and Lincoln has been teaching me about the local herbs we can use, so promise me you’ll take them when you need them.”

“I promise,” he tells her solemnly and she nods, releasing him and letting him go, though she stops him once again as he reaches the door and pulls it open, “And Marcus?” she says, causing him to turn back to look at her, “Take care of yourself.”

A soft smile touches his lips and he dips his head before he says quietly, “And you.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
